Cinchonidine derived thioureas

Scheme 6.112 Michael addition of thiophenol to an a,p-unsaturated imide catalyzed by cinchonidine-derived thiourea 116 and cinchonine-derived thiourea 117, the first representatives of this class of bifunctional hydrogen-bonding cinchona alkaloid-thioureas.

Recently, Chen and coworkers demonstrated that the cinchonine- or cinchonidine-derived thioureas, 63 and 66, respectively, were also able to catalyze the enantioselective... 

Optiinization of the aza-Michael addition of imides (286) to enones (285) has led to the identification of the cinchonidine-derived thiourea (284) and camphorsulfonic acid as the best organocatalytic system, affording (287) with <95% ee ... 

Michael addition of thioacetic acid to a series of a-substituted (V-acryloyloxazolidin-2-ones, followed by enantioselective protonation, catalysed by the cinchonidine-derived thiourea (288a), has been reported to proceed with <97% ee The pseudo-enantiomeric, cinchonine-derived thiourea (289a) can catalyse the Michael addition of dimedone to enone RCH=CHCO( -Py) with <98% ee The isosteviol-derived thiourea (290) represents yet another variation this organocatalyst has been reported to facilitate the Michael addition of a-substituted cyanoacetates NCCH(Ar)C02R and maleimides in toluene at -30 °C (with <93% ee and <98 2 dr) as a method for the construction of quaternary chiral centres " ... 

The extension of the thiourea-tertiary amine concept to the cinchona alkaloids was reported by several groups independently in 2005. The general usefulness of cinchona alkaloids as bifunctional catalysts was recognized by several groups even before this date [9]. The focus herein is on (thio)urea and squaramide catalysts since they are prototypes of more efficient catalysts. The Chen and the Dixon groups screened cinchonine and cinchonidine-derived thiourea catalysts for conjugate... 

In 2005, Chen and coworkers found that the epi-cinchonidine/cinchonine-derived thiourea catalysts, 79a,b, can serve as highly active promoters of the Michael addition ofthiophenol to the a,P-unsaturated imide 80 however, the reaction proceeded with low enantioselectivity (up to 17% ee) (Scheme 9.28) [22]. 

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